In an interview with military blog Defense Tech, the Army's Director of Research and Laboratory Management, Dr. John Parmentola described the military versions of some of the most advanced technology in development right now. For example, using electrical signals from the brain to control a wheelchair or output words to a computer is the civilian way of doing things. The Army envisions soldiers in contant, silent communication with each other, with the ability to silently activate and control machines just by thinking about it. That's a sci-fi action movie script that pretty much writes itself.

The quantum ghost effect is a little tougher to explain. Basically, you've got photons that pass across a smoke-obscured battlefield and simultaneously are and are not reflected by the smoke. Special computers could see through the smoke by taking advantage of the quantum link between both versions of the photons. Call it "Schrödinger's Howitzer."

Regarding the ultra-realistic holographic soldiers, the military wants them to act the part of enemies for more effective training exercizes. They can't just look real, though. They want AI that makes them act real. Dr. Parmentola seemed a bit credulous about the current state of development, however, saying, "I actually interact with virtual humans in terms of asking them questions and they're responding." Yeah, I was fooled by a bot on IM once too.

But what's this about World of Warcraft? The Army thinks online games are a perfect testing ground for their nascent AIs. They specifically mentioned WoW and EVE Online as games they want to infiltrate, sending in their "virtual soldiers" to see if they can deceive the human players. I think Blizzard should open up a bot only server.

Army Working On Science's Outer Limits. [Defense Tech]

Guomundsson has been working with EVE Online since 2004, when he was struck by the innovative idea behind the game's design — players would interact with each other to develop and trade the items they need within the game. EVE's 250,000 subscribers take part in up to one million transactions involving about 5,000 different items each day. They generate so much economic data that Guomundsson can't study it all, so he's looking for academic researchers who might be interested.

You might be wondering what the chief economist of a virtual world actually does. Guomundsson described his job as having three parts:

1. Gather economic data about EVE Online, then publish that information in EVE's quarterly economic journal.
2. Talk with the game's developers about potential changes to the game and what economic fallout those changes might bring.
3. Get the academic world interested in studying EVE's virtual economy.

As for what we might learn by studying these economic microcosms, he had some interesting points:

We can learn from watching the market behavior within a confined world like EVE Online and learn about how price bubbles, for instance, are formed, and what triggers them. I think if someone were to mine through our data, they would be able to find some interesting cases and examples of that.

We can also see in terms of social interaction...how people form groups, and what it is that makes people work together. EVE is a harsh world of hard competition, but still people come together to work for a common cause. What is it that lets those people come together?

He also pointed out that EVE Online would make an excellent business simulation. Business students could set up and run their own corporations, and see how their decisions play out in a complex market.

Image by: CCP. An Economist on the Virtual Economy. [BusinessWeek]

EVE Online has long been known for having one of the most complex economic systems of any MMORPG, and for being visually stunning. It is a pleasure to simply fly around the many star systems and take in the scenery, though you will eventually get your ass handed to you by pirates. With Empyrean Age, freebooters have become the least of your problems. Even high-security systems have fallen into the conflict, and everyone is choosing sides. Players have the opportunity to advance in ranks through their chosen militia by accepting missions from their warfare agent. Taking over a system control bunker will give your faction control of the system, but it will take a highly coordinated assault to get the job done. The expansion also opens a new region of space, The Black Rise. Fighting for control of these 49 new systems will affect the future shape of EVE Online. The war drums are beating (even though no one can hear them, on account of the vacuum). Image by: CCP.

War Is Coming: Empyrean Age. [CCP Games]